


Grandmother

by jaeseoksoo



Series: Sheith October Fest [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Bad Pranks, I have nothing witty to ad, M/M, This is a mess like my life is of course, i wrote this at 2 am, krolia is mentioned, obviously this is canon divergent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-04
Updated: 2018-10-04
Packaged: 2019-07-25 05:35:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16191134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaeseoksoo/pseuds/jaeseoksoo
Summary: After Voltron and Atlas saved Earth from the Galra invasion, everything is slowly going back to normal and Keith brings home Shiro to introduce him to his grumpy Galran grandmother.





	Grandmother

**Author's Note:**

> Day 3 of my Sheith October Fest. I'm so sleepy and I apologize in advance for the bad quality of this fic. More than usual anyway. I wrote this at 11 pm and finished like 2:30 am so this is unbeta'd but I just wanted to get this out today before everything collapses and escapes me tomorrow. Because NYCC.
> 
> P.S. Can you believe this is longer than my gratuitous porn? I can't either.

It’s impulsive and reckless but he swears to whatever space god’s out there that it’s totally not Keith’s idea. Keith’s still reluctant to push through with it—or not ever if Keith had his way—but Shiro’s insistent pleading which, in hindsight, proved to be one of Keith’s weakest points, was so compelling that Keith couldn’t refuse Shiro when he asks him that they pay a visit to Keith’s grandmother, his grandmother from the Galra side of his family. 

And really, Keith shouldn’t be worried. It’s not as if something’s going to go wrong, right? It’s just going to be a normal visit to a family member that, well, he never knew existed for the past twenty-one years of his life.

***

Keith’s behind the wheel as he and Shiro drive to the new city established several miles from the Garrison. He’s currently muttering under his breath about what a disaster this whole thing is going to be when his grandmother finds out he’s engaged to a human. Add to the fact that Keith’s only recently found out that he has another family member who wasn’t blown up along with Daibazaal? 

Honestly, he’s still reeling from that fact. 

The fact that there’s someone out there who will probably love and accept him for who he is the way Shiro and Krolia do? It feels amazing yet Keith couldn’t keep himself from feeling apprehension, too.

And of course, Keith’s still in the middle of being amazed and anxious when Shiro sprung to him the idea of visiting his grandmother so Keith can spend time with her and get to know her. It would have been fine for Keith but Shiro had to tack in that last part about wanting to formally introduce himself as Keith’s fiancé. 

It’s sweet and Keith would be lying if he said it didn’t make him go a little soft when he found out that Shiro’s taking great lengths to know everything about Keith, including his extended family. Even if this means having to meet his grumpy grandmother—Krolia’s words, not his—and possibly a rejection when she sees that Shiro isn’t sporting pointed ears and purple skin.

In his two years stuck with his mother on the back of a space whale, Keith doesn’t remember her ever explaining to him why his grandmother remains reluctant to bring other species into their fold despite how Krolia, her favorite child ended up with a human on a different planet, disappeared for a while before returning again. 

Oh wait, he wasn’t even told he has a grandmother then. 

“GAC for your thoughts?” 

Keith turns his head to look at Shiro only to find him wriggling his eyebrows like the dork he sometimes is. 

“GAC for our food maybe. I’m getting hungry,” Keith replies. “This is really a bad idea, Shiro.” Keith’s trying his best not to panic but the closer they get to the city, the more high-strung he seems to be. 

“What if my grandmother judges you before she gets to know you? What if she doesn’t like you?” Keith pauses. “Oh my god what if she doesn’t like me? We’re screwed.”

“Keith, Keith.. Relax. Just, it’s scary right now but I think we’re going to be alright. We’ll be alright. Have more confidence, please?” Shiro is reassuring but Keith is still thinking the worst.

“My galran grandmother!” Keith thumps his head on the steering wheel once, twice, until Shiro reaches out and cushions his next attempts.

“Stop that, you’re going to get us killed!” Shiro has the nerve to laugh out loud beside Keith so Keith stretches his right arm out to fake-punch Shiro in the face, the older man playing along and overreacting with a high-pitched, “ow, is this how you treat your fiancé? You are merciless.” 

“Seriously, I’m still wondering why mom deliberately left out Grandma Karna’s existence when we bonded those two years in space. Urgh.” 

Keith eyes Shiro as he raises an eyebrow and a shoulder as though saying ‘this is exactly why’. 

“Specie shock? Maybe Ms. Krolia—uh, mom—didn’t want to surprise you so much. After all, you just found out you’re half Galra. Maybe she plans to tell you after—“ Shiro makes a sweeping gesture—“after everything’s cleared up and more stable. She did tell you about her when you were resting.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Keith agrees half-heartedly. He’s excited, really, to meet another family member but he can’t help but worry—worry that he’d fuck up and do something undesirable and irreparable without his knowledge. Or that he isn’t.. Galra enough for his conservative grandmother.  
Will his grandmother even care that he’s saved Earth, the planet she now lives in, from invaders? Their own kind? Will she think highly of Shiro the way Keith thinks highly of him? Or will she take one look at Shiro and dismiss him outright just because he is not like them? To Keith, Shiro is the kindest and most wonderful and man he has ever met. Shiro makes up a big part of his life now, his raison d'etre, his soulmate. He doesn’t know how accepting he will be of someone who finds fault in Shiro and their relationship. He doesn’t know if he will be able to choose his family over Shiro if it ever came to that. 

These worries, unfounded or valid, plague Keith throughout their drive and this worry must have made its way on his face because seconds later, reassuring fingers are curling against his nape, warm thumb caressing his cheek. He leans into Shiro’s hand and feels his anxiety lessen to a degree.

They stay like that, not saying anything, with Shiro’s hand on Keith the whole ride. 

***

Keith parks outside a modest-sized two storey house. There’s a well-manicured front lawn with assorted flowers, some of it Keith doesn’t remember ever seeing on earth. He and Shiro climb the steps toward the front porch. Keith raises a hand to knock when Shiro raises his own and covers Keith’s fist, bringing it close to his heart.

“Keith,” Shiro begins. “No matter what happens today, know that I won’t ever let anything or anyone separate us ever again. You’ve been through a lot and you deserve this. You deserve us. We’ll fight for us, okay?”

“Alright, Shiro. Alright,” Keith replies. He leans in to kiss Shiro on the mouth just as the door slams open and a woman as tall as Krolia looks down at Keith and Shiro. Their faces are merely inches apart, eyes like saucers as they stare at Karna with her hip leaning against the doorframe and an unimpressed scowl gracing her otherwise beautiful face.

It takes but a split second before her face relaxes and the scowl is replaced by a genuine smile, lighting up her face. She has an ethereal quality to her and doesn’t look a year over 40. Keith can see which side of the family his mother inherited her looks from.

“Too early for a make-out session on my porch, don’t you think?” 

“Uh,” Keith says unintelligently. Keith would have apologized but before he can do so, he finds himself being lifted off his feet and enveloped in a bear hug. Shiro remains rooted beside him, eyes wide with surprise.

“Keith, oh Keith, I’ve always wanted to meet you and finally, here you are. Here you are, oh my dear sweet boy. Saving the earth, saving the universe? You’re truly a spitting image of your mom. So delicate and so beautiful. And that knack for saving others, oh, that has always been her biggest strength.”

“Uh,” Keith starts again. His cheeks feel warm as his grandmother plants a small kiss there before inviting them inside her house.

“Wait, let me guess. Krolia told you what a grumpy old lady I am who’s partial to pure Galrans and so you’re scared of me? Did I get that right?”

“Yes.”

“Oh dear. It’s been years and she still thinks so little of me. My, my. I will need to have a word with my daughter. Someday. When she comes to visit again.”

Keith visibly relaxes. “I don’t know why mom would think it’s funny to prank me like this,” Keith tries to say without pouting. “This really gave me anxiety.”

He takes the tea offered to him by Karna (it’s delicious and he would come back a few more times in this house for the tea and for his grandmother, of course.)

“She’s always had a weird sense of humor, that one.” Karna chuckles. “And oh this handsome boy right here, Takashi Shirogane? It is so good to finally see you in the flesh. Finally. The betrothed of my only grandchild.”

Shiro extends an arm and Karna clutches it both with hers before he is pulled towards her and hugged for the second time that day. 

“Your speech.. I heard it when Krolia showed me a copy of the ceremony. Those were beautiful words. They touched my heart. I can see why Keith would be so taken with you. He has good taste in men.”

Keith tries his best not to be flustered by his grandmother’s frankness but Shiro, who has been silent beside Keith the whole time, bless his heart, has decided to mimic a tomato with his red face, ears probably burning from the praise and the embarrassment. As if he wasn’t going to be marrying Keith in a few years time. Months, if he had any say on it (which he does because it’s HIS and Shiro’s wedding, after all). 

“I’m just a normal person with a lot of flaws, Ma’am. But.. I tell you this: I’ll do my best to take care of Keith’s happiness, make sure he doesn’t get into too much trouble especially when he’s with me.”

“I know you will,” Karna positively says. “The moment I laid eyes on you on that porch, I knew, I felt it in my gut that there would be nobody else for my Keith. The Galra—” Keith doesn’t fail to notice the somber tone his grandmother has reverted to, “—mate once in their life. They choose one person to live and grow old with for the rest of their days. And their days will be long and almost immeasurable and so they must choose someone who understands them and accepts them for who they are. And to Keith, you are that person, Shiro.”

***

“She wasn’t so bad,” Shiro muses cheerfully. “Maybe when I come visit next time I can invite her to our wedding?”

Keith sighs and looks fondly at Shiro. “You know what? At this point I think she’s already invited herself to our wedding. She likes you and it could have been worst but the universe is nice this time and she actually likes you. I still can’t believe it.”

“The universe liking me… or.. your grandmother liking me?”

“How about me liking you? It IS unbelievable isn’t it? With how insufferable you can be sometimes urgh, why do I put up with you again?”

“Because you love me.”

Keith sighs again but the smile on his face mirrors the smile on Shiro’s as he turns the wheel and parks beside his bicycle stowed in a corner of the Garrison hangar.

“Yes, because I do. And you’re lucky that’s never going to change any time soon.”

“Or ever.”

“Or ever, indeed."

**Author's Note:**

> *somewhere in space*
> 
> Krolia: Did I go too far?
> 
> Kolivan: Yeah. You should've pulled back your punch a bit. Keith will get mad at you when you go visit.
> 
> Krolia: I thought it was funny that time. Grandmother Karna was always grumpy with me.
> 
> Kolivan: I don't think it's her fault.
> 
> \--
> 
>  
> 
> Come shout at me and tell me how bad this idea is on twitter: @sheitheist


End file.
